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Neofeudalism Defined For The Little Man? I Mean The Little Mind?

“Much as warlords seized land in the Norman Conquest and levied rent on subject populations (starting with the Domesday Book, the great land census of England and Wales ordered by William the Conqueror), so today’s financialized mode of warfare uses debt leverage and foreclosure to prey away land, natural resources and economic infrastructure. The commons are privatized by bondholders and bankers, gaining control of government and shifting taxes onto labor and small scale industry. Household accounts, corporate balance sheets and public budgets are earmarked increasingly to pay real estate rent, monopoly rent, interest and financial fees, and to bear the taxes shifted off rentier wealth. The rentier oligarchy makes itself into a hereditary aristocracy lording it over the population at large from gated communities that are the modern counterpart to medieval castles with their moats and parapets.”

One thought on “Neofeudalism Defined For The Little Man? I Mean The Little Mind?”

The gate communities will someday become glaring targets for desperate people. The text you set in bold makes one think.

Funny how difficult it is to really own a piece of property. In the States, just try not paying property taxes … or, buy property in France as a (gulp) foreigner … and it reverts to ownership of the State upon one’s death. There’s a lesson there somewhere. Perhaps it is that we can’t really own what is not ours in the first place.